Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Tuesday evening I told my wife our 1800g albino should have eggs on the ground by morning. She still looks this way today. Last night I picked up her hide, gently palpated to see if anything felt odd and took these pictures. I put her hide back over her leaving the back half of her body out of the hide. As of this morning she was in roughly the same position. She should have at least coiled herself back in her hide overnight. I'll be contacting our herp vet today. This is her 1st clutch but it's about our 35th over the last 5 years so we're not rookies here. Your opinions are welcome...
Paul

she does look ready thats for sure. as you probably know, there is a condition referred to as eggbound. i have never seen a pic of an eggbound snake, nor had one myself so i dont know. how many eggs did you feel? to me, it looks like its going to be a small cluth of large eggs. how big was she before breeding? im sure your vet will be able to help. i hope all goes well, and she is just "holding out". best of luck, im pulling for you and her.
joe

She's got 6 eggs in her. Her grandmother was the first ball python to produce for me. Her lineage typically lays eggs around 120g each and very robust hatchlings. I usually only see such well-defined eggs during oviposition, which looked like it was going to be on Tuesday. The reason I'm particularly concerned is that she didn't appear to move from the position I left her in last night with the back half of her body out of the hide. Thanks.
Paul

Looks eggbound to me. There are various ways of dealing with this as you probably know. I would act sooner rather than later. Best of luck.

paul, that does seem odd that she wouldnt coil up again after being disturbed. again, hopefully she is just being quirky.
good luck and keep us updated please.
joe

Wow any minute now! Soak two large handfulls of sphagnum moss in hot! water wring it out vigoruosly and put it in a dark large roomy nest box. This usaully does the trick. If she hasnt laid by now. jlotto22.

Has she laid yet?

I'm no expert but of all mine I've seen lay -- none of them seemed to back up like that.

Perhaps a little KY around her cloaca area and a gentle massage?
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Tosha
JET Pythons

Yeah, that doesn't look too good to me either. Best of luck with her and the eggs Paul.
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www.dbherp.com

After viewing the images and acknowledging the risks with each of the various intervention methods, he thinks there is still a reasonable chance she'll go ahead and lay the eggs on her own. I left work early to check on her and she has coiled herself back into her hide / nest. We'll continue to check here for additional comments, and we do appreciate them all. I'll post updates when needed. Thank you.
Paul

what temp?

how many days?

make her hide moist..my girls seemed to roll around in the water alot this year if I left the cage dry out fully......I dumped alot of water bowls in the nest areas for them..

I never saw a girl with lumps like she has under her rear........keep an eye on her (you are).....aspiration would be the first method......the first egg at vent......it will be alot of fluid to take out........I don't know if oxytosin works on snakes........(think not really )........

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So far this year we've got 9 clutches from our 18-bin breeding rack. Days from shed to lay are: Min=24, Max=31, Mean=27. This girl is now at day 32, which wouldn't bother me at all if she hadn't looked like this for a few days now. Temp is 88 at the nest site. I'm adding more and wetter cypress to her nest site, then going to let her rest for the night. I'll choose aspiration over oxytocin if it comes to that. Thanks Jeff.
Paul

We're taking her in to get the 2 large eggs nearest the vent aspirated. Hopefully she'll be able to pass the clutch once those 2 big ones are deflated.
Paul

the best! Good luck, im sure everything will go fine from there. Please keep us posted.
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watch the vet,....

I do it myself...I feel better knowing I did it...

I'm cheap too...

3 to 5 cc syringes and 18 ga. needles on them....(with balls maybe 20 cc syringes? gawd...)

.....good luck......

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Yep, 18 gauge needle and 20cc syringes...80cc's from the first egg and over 90cc's from the 2nd. Also a calcium injection to help with contractions if/when she's ready. She looks much better now with those 2 eggs deflated and it looks like the other eggs have moved down some. So, now we cross our fingers and wait again. Thanks everybody.
Paul

She's acting more like a typical gravid ball now, so we've got our fingers crossed that she'll go ahead and lay her eggs without further complications. I'll post any new developments.
Paul